


This is Our Country

by poisontaster



Series: Heart 'Verse [15]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Amnesiac Dean, Hand Jobs, Injury, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-02-27
Updated: 2008-02-27
Packaged: 2018-05-14 09:08:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,809
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5737840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poisontaster/pseuds/poisontaster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>3 months after Chains of Babylon, early Year 5.  This is the new normal.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This is Our Country

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ginger_sunshine](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=ginger_sunshine).



> This was written for ginger_sunshine for Sweet Charity, as part of her bound edition of Chains of Babylon.

The problem is that Sam forgets.

He looks at Dean and sees only his brother. From the goofy and gap-toothed boy that taught him to pee by hitting squares of TP in the toilet to the goofy and exasperating man sleeping the sleep of the drugged behind him in the bed, Sam just sees Dean. And that's a mistake.

A mistake that nearly got both of them killed last night.

Sam stares at himself in the mirror for several moments longer before sluicing lukewarm water over his face and wincing as it stings in the scrapes. He'd really love to be having his own chemical romance tonight and fall into the arms of Lady Percocet before he falls into his brother's, but he feels uneasy at the prospect of both of them offline. God knows even regular sleep is difficult; since nearly losing Dean in Asher's Grove, Sam wakes a half dozen times a night in a sweat, heart hammering against his rib cage like the bass line at a rave.

In the mirror, Sam looks past his own reflection to Dean, only his legs visible at this angle. As usual, Dean's thrown the cover off and then curled up because he's cold. In his more ridiculous moments, Sam wonders if it's Dean's way of inviting Sam to come and warm him up, except that even with amnesia Dean's not that subtle.

And there it is, the word that Sam's mind skitters uneasily around at every available opportunity. Amnesia. Dean has amnesia. And Sam needs to stop forgetting that.

There's nothing else to do tonight. Sam pops some ibuprofen, rinses the dried blood from his mouth and pads back into the main room, tonguing absently at the split in his bottom lip. Dean was nodding even as Sam stitched him up, so he's still shirtless, the bandage and tape barely whiter than his skin. The rest of his bruises and cuts are coloring nicely and the faint honey smell of arnica salve valiantly tries to cover the scent of eau de Dean.

Sam slips in behind his brother, already shoving before he's even all the way on the mattress. Dean hums tunelessly and shifts, only malleable in his sleep. Once Sam is down and mostly settled, Dean makes the same interrogative noise and rolls back, unbending a little when the warmth of Sam's skin hits him. Sam puts his arm over Dean's waist, careful to avoid the bandage and the wound beneath it. Dean hums a third time, jerks like a dog having a bad dream and then starts to snore—mercifully softly.

Sam rests his forehead against the back of Dean's head and closes his eyes.

***

Sam isn't particularly good at taking care of Dean.

It's a truth he doesn't like facing up to, but a truth that's unavoidable. He tries. He busts his ass to take care of Dean the way Dean's always taken care of him (even when Sam didn't really want or need him to), but so much about him and Dean has always been learned on an instinctive level; gut deep reflexes that he can't rely on anymore because they're wrong. One half of the equation of them has been erased and Sam doesn't know the variables anymore.

He is conscious again that he's a youngest son, a person who's never had to take care of anything more complicated than Jess's houseplants. And the part of him that fought desperately for straight A's and Stanford and Jess and Dean himself is crazy with the notion that he can't seem to master this too.

Fuck that. He's gotten them this far. He's not going to lose Dean.

He'll get this too.

***

He wakes to Dean's hand between his legs, palm-stroking his cock.

Sam opens his eyes. Dean is looking at him, the corner of his mouth curved up crookedly. There's enough light through the curtains to see the darkness of Dean's irises, the want in them. At the same time, there's a question there, an _is this okay?_ that Dean now leaves unspoken but that still remains.

This will fade, Sam reminds himself. Even if Dean never gets his memory back—and he will—time and repetition will create familiarity, intimacy, again. Sam just has to be patient. And in the meantime…

Sam puts his hand over Dean's and writhes his hips into the touch, sending grinding little shockwaves from his cock simultaneously up to his brain and down to his toes. _Thank you, God. Thank you for letting me have this._ "Hey."

Dean's smile widens. "Hey."

"Probably…probably not a good idea f'r you to exert yourself too much," Sam says, stammering over the words as Dean drags the heel of his hand slowly down Sam's shaft. "Don't want you popping stitches."

Dean makes a brief face that smoothes away into a grin. "More than one way to get off, Sammy m'boy," he says, sounding so much like Dean (and Sam's not thinking real; he's not going to fall into the trap of thinking of Dean now as somehow 'not real') that Sam's heart gives a little hopeful jump in his chest.

"Yeah," Sam agrees slowly, letting his own smile widen and burn. "Guess there is." He skims his palm up Dean's leg from the knee, watching the lines at the corner of Dean's eyes crinkle deeper as it tickles his leg hair. When Sam gets to the top of Dean's briefs, he tugs at the waistband. Dean lifts up a little and Sam wrestles the briefs down, letting Dean's cock spring free to slap his belly.

"Easy." Half-hidden by the curve of Dean's body, Sam almost forgot Dean's wound again, just that fast, but the maneuver of getting Dean out of his underwear makes Dean grunt. It sounds more like surprise than pain, but Sam knows Dean's noises. He wraps his fingers around Dean's cock and with his other hand, soothes his brother down.

"I'm all right."

Just the right note of irritation there and Sam hates himself for this constant state of comparison and he can't make himself stop.

"Yeah," he says roughly, stripping Dean's cock with hard, short jerks. "Yeah, you're fine."

When Dean returns the favor—long, slow tugs that make Sam's eyes cross—Sam just lets his eyes close like they want to, forehead coming to rest against Dean's. Dean spider-walks his other arm over Sam's side to stroke secret messages down Sam's spine, ones that send all the blood rushing to the surface of his skin, to his dick, heavy and full in his brother's grip.

Every time Sam opens his eyes Dean's still looking at him, wide-eyed and open-mouthed, breathing across Sam's lips in airy almost-kisses. And this…

This is the best of the new Dean, the part Sam feels the worst about because he loves this. He loves this Dean who accepts the truth of them so easily, who doesn't remember a time when it wasn't Sam and Dean against the world, who doesn't remember anyone in his bed but Sam. "Dean," he breathes, writhing into that touch.

There's a point where he feels like this is all he needs, as if he doesn't even need to come, just letting that pleasure run through him like a current, thick and sweet. He wanders Dean's body by touch, fingering the sparse hairs that rim the hard nipples, the bristly stubble shadowing Dean's jaw. He like the way Dean gasps and his fingers twitch, trying not to tighten over Sam's cock, when Sam fondles Dean's balls and it seems like an eternity of this could be all he needs.

But then it always tips over the edge. A brush across his slit, the texture of a thumb across those nerves just under the head or the way Dean twists his wrist at the end of the stroke…something small, something simple and the fire licks up from Sam's belly and ignites inside him, turning it all to urgency and need.

"Dean," he says again, deeper, more desperate.

"Yeah." Dean sounds distracted but his hand is sure, dragging Sam toward orgasm. His eyes flicker as if they're trying to watch everything about Sam all at once.

Jesus. Fuck.

Dean's tongue rasps up Sam's chin, saunters into his mouth, licking out his cries like dollops of ice cream with soft curls of the tip. Sam can only take it, trembling out his load into the palm of Dean's hand. He doesn't have the muscle control to stroke Dean but he grips as best he can, letting Dean rut himself in the taut circle of Sam's fingers. Dean's licks turn to moans that counterpoint the rusty squeak of the bed.

"Sammy…" Dean whispers like it's wrung out of him and then he gives it up in sweet-hot scalds across Sam's palm and wrist and belly. Sam lets Dean go to pull him closer, smearing him in his own come. The fever heat of Dean's skin counteracts the morning chill and they sort of melt into each other, sated and sleepy again.

"I want to quit hunting," Sam says, wanting to get it out before he can lose his nerve. "Just for a while," he adds quickly when Dean stiffens and starts to pull away. "Just…so we can train." Sam pushes back far enough that he can brush Dean's bandage with his fingers. Blood has seeped through the gauze and he'll need to check it again soon. "We're cutting it too close, Dean."

Dean's got no particular expression on his face, but there's no mistaking his tone when he spits, "Because I'm not the man I used to be. Look, I told you, man…"

"No. Wait." Sam puts his hand over Dean's mouth. "Shut up a minute. Listen to me. You keep telling me… You keep telling me you're not 'that other' Dean, that I can't treat you like him, that I can't keep thinking you're the same person, because you're not. Well, okay. I believe you."

Dean's eyes widen and he jerks his face away from Sam's hand, but he stays silent, mouth clenched into a tight line.

 _"I believe you,"_ Sam repeats. "But that means I need to get to know the guy I'm with now. And you need to get to know me. We can be better than this." He touches the bandage again, pushes just hard enough to make Dean feel it. Now that he's cooling down again, he's feeling his own aches and pains again, and his split lip's throbbing in time to his heartbeat. "We are better than this."

Dean doesn't like it; Sam can tell Dean doesn't like it, the furious line of his mouth unbending. But from his eyes, Sam can tell Dean will give in. And that's enough.

 _I'll take care of you_ , Sam thinks. _I'll be good at it. I'll learn._


End file.
